Tilbury Power Station on the banks of the Thames may no longer have to close
after RWE npower approved a plan to convert it into the world's largest
biomass plant.

RWE believes it will be just as cheap for the plant to burn wood pellets as coal, as there are Government subsidies for renewables and a raft of taxes on fossil-fuel plants.

This potentially paves the way for more of Britain's coal-fired power stations to convert their furnaces to burn wood pellets or other biomass material. A third of the UK's power stations are due to close by 2015 under European laws, including the 1,000 megawatt station at Tilbury.

While burning biomass does not automatically save Tilbury from scheduled closure, RWE is expected to apply to Europe for an exemption if this year's trials at the station are successful.

Converting more older coal stations to biomass could help to solve a headache for the Government, which is facing the prospect of an energy gap after 2015 when the coal stations shut but no new nuclear plants and few wind farms are yet on stream.

Burning biomass on such a scale has never been attempted before. The majority of fuel will be transported from RWE's wood pellet plant in Georgia in the US.